Camps Mission

To create supportive environments for culturally diverse youth and adults to reach their fullest potential by:

• providing a safe, enjoyable outdoor learning experience,
• providing opportunities to develop leadership, social and group living skills while fostering creativity, independence and responsibility,
• offering a choice of age appropriate programs that build confidence and self-esteem,
• encouraging an understanding and respect for the environment, animals, agriculture, and natural resources,
• building an appreciation and acceptance of the differences in people, and
• developing a caring community.

In keeping with the 4-H mission, Massachusetts 4-H camps share the same goals:

• to have fun,
• to learn about the outdoors,
• to learn to live, work and play with others,
• to learn self-reliance,
• to learn to get along away from home,
• to increase confidence and self-esteem,
• to develop some new skills and interests.

The most readily identifiable, general educational objectives for our camps are the processes that may be related to five life-skill areas:

• Self-Understanding - acquiring secondary skills, which support the development of self and which aid others in pursuit of personal potential;
• Communicating - artfully exchanging thoughts or information verbally and non-verbally to enhance cooperation and learning;
• Decision-Making - recognizing life as a sequence of events, a pattern of steps, or a progression of challenges that require choices at each level; learning to learn; using the scientific method; fostering a spirit of inquiry to lead one around, over, or through obstacles encountered;
• Managing Resources - using acquired knowledge to contribute to humanism while preserving and protecting the natural environment;
• Coping - contending with difficulties which may arise unexpectedly in our changing environments and learning to act in order to survive those challenges without physical, social, or psychological suffering and with possibilities for growth in any or all of those areas.

Our camps also have a strong commitment to LEADERSHIP - using the above life skills in positive way to bring self and others to new discoveries, improved relationships, and increased skills.

The 4-H mission, the pledge, the motto, and the slogan provide the basis for maintaining the rich traditions of our camps. These traditions are taught to enhance and expand the learning experience.

At camp, the four H's (Head, Heart, Hands, and Health) serve as guides to forming decisions about daily living, while the four areas (Club/Camp, Community, Country, and World) serve as reminders of the many facets of our interaction with our surroundings.